The present invention relates to a workpiece sorting machine and more particularly to an automated workpiece sorting, dimensional inspection and segregation machine for fasteners.
With increasing world-wide competition in manufacturing, reducing production costs while maintaining, if not improving, quality of the manufactured workpiece is paramount. When the workpiece is manufactured in large quantities, unique challenges in the manufacturing process are presented. For instance, the manufacturing of a fastener or threaded bolt as the workpiece requires dimensional inspection of each bolt which may not be visible to the naked eye. Moreover, to accomplish inspection, the fasteners or bolts must be arranged in an orderly fashion. Fasteners which do not meet pre-established quality guidelines must also be segregated from the remaining fasteners which are ultimately counted and delivered to the customer. Preferably, and as a cost cutting measure, the segregated rejected fasteners are recycled.
Within an assembly line operation, manual operator arrangement of hundreds, if not thousands, of fasteners is cost prohibitive. Likewise, manual inspection of many different types of workpieces or fasteners may lead to operator error, may not be possible due to sight limitations of the naked eye, or simply may not be possible due to the speed in which the fasteners pass along the assembly line.
A sorting machine receives a bulk of workpieces or fasteners from a hopper unit into a feed station which align the fasteners into a single file for engagement to a transport system of an inspection station. Preferably, the transport system has a conveyor belt with a magnetic member disposed radially inward from the belt. The fasteners are preferably ferrous and thereby engage the conveyor belt via the magnetic field which penetrates the belt. The fasteners are thus carried along the transport system past a trigger sensor which sends a signal to a central controller to timely actuate a dimensional sensing apparatus which takes an image of the fastener and sends it to the central computer for dimensional analysis. If the fastener fails to meet pre-established guidelines the nonconforming fastener is ejected from the transport system via a reject mechanism. If the fastener conforms, it continues to move along the transport system, past a counter sensor and is then dropped off the conveyor belt of the transport system into a packaging station for ultimate delivery to the customer.
Advantages of the present invention include an automated inspection and sorting machine capable of improving quality of a manufactured workpiece, reducing required manpower, increased speed and efficiency of manufacturing, and is a robust and relatively inexpensive and user friendly design.